In the sporting world, several different types of competitive shooting involving shotguns have emerged over the years including, trap, skeet, sporting clays and a variation of skeet and sporting clays administered by the Federation Internationale de Tir Aux Sportives de Chasse, or the “FITSC.”
In FITSC, strategically placed clay target throwers (called traps) set to simulate live game birds and animals; e.g., teal, rabbits, pheasant. Shooters on each layout or “parcour”, shoot in turn at various combinations of single and double clay birds. Each station or “peg” on a parcour will have a menu card that lets the shooter know the sequence of clay birds he or she will be shooting at (i.e. which trap the clay bird will be coming from).
In order to establish the parcour, the traps or throwers must be positioned and adjusted to throw the sequence of targets generally in the following simulations: rabbit, chandelle, overhead, trap (outgoing), crossing, teal (launched straight up into the air), and as an incoming bird. The targets are shot as singles and as doubles (double targets can be simultaneous, on report or trailing/following-“rafael” in FITASC terminology).
Courses are laid out with as many as 13 stations, sometimes as many as 16 or more where shooters may shoot at as many as 8 targets each and generally will throw a set of targets in order to see how the peg is to be “played” or shot.
Therefore, it takes as many as 234 clay targets just for a pair of shooters to complete shooting a 13 station course. If 50 pairs of shooters were to compete in one day, 11,700 clay targets would have to be thrown by 26 throwers in the 13 stations. It should be noted that the typical course, regardless of number of stations, includes 100 shots by each shooter, plus any broken clays or target “peeks” involving throwing the birds to view how the station is to be played.
The throwers are typically remotely actuated by a controller provided at each station. Atop the throwers are carousels which contain stacks of clay targets (also referred to herein as clays) such that when the carousel is actuated, it rotates the stacks and a clay is positioned to drop onto a plate where a spring actuated throwing arm is pre-positioned to engage the clay and throw it with a certain amount of stabilizing spin.
Presently, these carousels are hand loaded with clays, necessitating the transport of boxes of clays to the throwers so that a person may open each box, grab a number of clays from within and stack them in columns in the carousel positioned atop the thrower. This is a labor intensive effort and because clays are fairly fragile, some breakage of clays during the process is inevitable.
What is needed is a way to load these carousels with clays in a manner which is not only faster, but results in less breakage.
It is not uncommon to have clays “jam” in the carousel when actuated or break from being cocked as a result of improper stacking during the filling of the carousel. Further, it is difficult to determine if a clay has been cracked during refill of the carousel by hand; the realization coming upon the throwing of the target when it is ejected from the thrower in pieces. Hairline fractures cannot be readily seen, especially within a stack of several clays. If during hand loading of the carousel, several clays are dropped into place incorrectly or are in a cocked position when dropped onto the stack, undetected damage may be done to one or more clays.
What is needed is a better method of loading a carousel by minimizing the handling of the clay targets.
Another factor which affects the integrity of clay targets is exposure to heat, cold and moisture. Admittedly, most shooting courses attempt to protect their traps from the elements. However, it is not practical to move the traps indoors from their setup position daily for protection. Sometimes enclosures are used for the throwers in the case of trap and skeet ranges as the need to continually move the throwers does not exist. For sporting clays, the setup of throwers is continually changed, making the use of enclosures more cumbersome.
In such cases, coverings such as canvass, tarps, plastic or other temporary means are employed to protect the carousels of clay targets. These coverings are certainly less effective than stationary enclosures, and the deterioration of clay targets on sporting clay ranges is more problematic. What is needed is a means of protecting carousels and their targets more effectively on sporting clay courses.
As mentioned, the number of shooters visiting a sporting clays range during a competition or group “shoot” means that many targets will be used and consequently, reloading of carousels will be necessary. By the sheer numbers of targets consumed in a shoot, inevitably shooters must standby while others spend valuable time hand loading carousels. In the case of a jammed thrower, this can lead to disruption of the competition. Operators of such courses must urge shooters to resist intervening on their own to clear jammed throwers when forced to wait until maintenance personnel or mechanics arrive to clear the machines. By intervening, shooters create a safety hazard to themselves and others as they are typically not trained how to operate and maintain the throwers, creating a potentially dangerous situation and likely a violation of the course insurance policies.
What is needed is a more efficient means of reloading carousels during competitive shoots when time pressure is at its highest, as well as assuring that the potential for weak or cracked clays in the carousels is minimized. Such a solution will assure timely use of the course and minimize potential safety hazards.
To quantify the problem further, clay target manufacturers estimate premature target breakage as high as 5%. Reducing human handling of targets can reduce that percentage significantly.
Typically, clay targets of 108 mm diameter are used for most throws. In international competition, clays to 110 mm may be used. In other cases, clays as small as 90 mm or smaller can be used as targets. With these varying sizes, carousels must be configured to handle either the 108-110 mm size, or be reconfigured to handle 90 mm targets such that the targets are properly positioned to drop onto the throwing plate properly. As a result, courses must have carousels of more than one configuration in order to accommodate the various clay target sizes. What is needed is a solution to having to use differently configured carousels to throw clay targets of differing size. Expense and labor would each be saved by having a method or device which facilitates the throwing of multiple sizes of clays without having to reconfigure a carousel or replace it entirely with another trap so configured.